


Coming Home

by simply_gorgeous



Category: The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Genre: F/M, Gen, Happy Ending, Healing is always the goal, Lonliness, botw, feeling lost, guys its just all the feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-07
Updated: 2021-02-07
Packaged: 2021-03-13 06:15:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29273823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/simply_gorgeous/pseuds/simply_gorgeous
Summary: Hyrule was saved. They had won. Would it ever be enough? The loneliness was wearying, and sometimes the grief seemed to have seeped bone-deep. It had been a long time since they had had worries of this kind, but that could wait until it felt like coming home.OrLink and Zelda are happy they won and trying to move forward, but feeling the bitter-sweetness of victory in its entirety. What does Link do after fighting and defeating the Calamity? How does Zelda rule without her father? How do they cope when they're lonely? Isolated?
Kudos: 6





	Coming Home

**Author's Note:**

> I left this one pretty plotless. It should just be a fresh and cozy short. :) Hope you like!

The wind whispered alongside Zelda on the other side of the great glass windows, brushing up against the stone wall and rustling through the full trees. This hallway was long. The royal crest decorated the walls, and the ceiling was an intricate mosaic of stonework. But it was empty. Her footsteps seemed to echo despite the thick, heavy carpet beneath her feet, but maybe it was the thudding of her lonely heart she heard.

Hyrule was saved. 

The wind raced in gusts across the fields of Central Hyrule and sped up the hills to comb through Link’s hair. The view from this hilltop was magnificent with the rolling landscape. There were greys of stone buildings, browns of the wooden support systems being used in repairing them, and blue sparkling pools that spotted a quilt of deep emerald to pastel greens. It felt big. So big. Almost as big as the whole in his heart.

They had won.

Another document signed, another chest packed for the next trip to rebuild a town. Hyrule’s restoration would take years and years to complete, and Zelda still wasn’t sure if hers would be a reign remembered as one of healing or of the sickness that had made healing a necessity. She didn’t know if it mattered. She was still recovering from the sickness of losing her father—the only family she’d had left. He certainly would want it to matter to her. 

She sighed and slid the pen back into its ink rest. It was time to depart, and she still hadn’t even changed out of her nightclothes.

Would it ever be enough?

Another day in the saddle, another visit to the Forgotten Temple—it was the only place Link felt at peace, lost as much as the goddess statue that stood tall and imposing and forgotten. He didn’t have a place anymore. He was the hero of legend, the princess’s appointed knight, the wielder of the sword that seals the darkness. Was. None of those titles meant anything now. Those who knew the stories brushed him off as a mere descendent or successor of the hero. Impa knew. And the princess.

Link stood from his perch on the altar steps, back toward the goddess and brushed himself off. Perhaps it was time for a visit to her royal highness. 

The loneliness was wearying.

Zelda sighed as the carriage rolled to a stop at the castle’s front steps. The journey hadn’t been lengthy, but the troubles of the people were large. During the extensive drive from Castletown, up the winding path through the gatehouses, along the ribboning walls that bordered the cliff sides, and past the grand—and now borken—pavilion she had closed her eyes, allowing memories to fill in the blanks in the picture of what used to lay beyond her window.

The castle had been among the first buildings to have been rebuilt, against her wishes, but it would never look the same. It had been a unanimous decision that “the princess who gave her soul for so many years had earned the peace of her home restored to her.” She couldn’t tell them that seeing the same halls and walls and ceilings and floors bereft of movement, sound, and life was anything but peaceful. It was a sadness that went beyond words.

Sometimes the grief seemed to have seeped bone-deep.

Her tower had always been high, but Link knew the castle inside and out in both grander and ruin, so this in-between state held no secrets from him. He was up the wall and in the princess’s chambers before the squirrel on the windowsill had finished eating its acorn. 

Squirrel meat was light and well-textured and had an aftertaste of nut. He still hunted and ate it from time to time whenever he couldn’t quite get down the finely mashed potatoes with no lumps, smooth gravy with too much salt, and shaped veggie platters sold at inns. It didn’t always feel like real food, and Link would rather go hungry until he could catch and cook something over an abandoned bokoblin camp’s pot. 

Link wondered what the princess ate these days in the absence of a staff. There were no cooks, no maids, no tailors, and no guard. Despite the still-high number of monsters in Hyrule, there were no more than a dozen patrol officers for the entire castle, and though he respected their courage, Link doubted the effectiveness of the handful of farmers and travelers who had volunteered to protect the last Hylian of royal blood. 

It had been a long time since they had had worries of this kind. 

Zelda ran a hand through her hair in frustration, toying with the idea of chopping it all off. 

The Goron were unfriendly toward the prospect of Hyrule having a central government once again, and the Zora were highly suspicious of any Hylian other than Link. The Gerudo still only allowed females into the town which made diplomatic efforts solely her responsibility, and Hylians were so spread out across the map, she was beginning to despair ever being able to bring unity back to the kingdom. 

She couldn’t complain about the Rito, but the Sheikah Slate was refusing to function properly—it wouldn’t allow access to the teleportation function at all—and hadn’t since Link had returned it to her. She missed him. 

But that could wait until…

There he was. Sitting on her chaise with dirty boots, a traveler’s hood, and bags under his eyes that told her that she wasn’t the only one with nightmares that ravaged her mind in the hours of darkness. His clothes looked new enough, but she noticed blades of grass sticking out of some of the stitching and a leaf caught in one of the buttons. So he had been adventuring again. 

The silence had stretched taut, and Zelda knew she had been standing still too long. But his eyes had never left her, so she wasn’t the only one to blame. Besides, what could be said?

“I see settling down hasn’t settled well with you.”

He had been fond of puns back in simpler times though he tried not to show it. It was one of the things he had retained despite the memory loss. But he did not chuckle at it now.

“I’m thinking of cutting my hair.” 

Silence. Stupid. Why would she talk about her hair in front of him? But it was too late to go back now. Better to follow through and then move on to something else that would hopefully distract from her poor topic choice.

“I would never have been allowed before, but I don’t think anyone would think ill of it now. People don’t view royalty as they used to.”

“Zelda.”

Her eyes closed at the sound of his voice as the heavy tones cascaded through her mind. It was childish and unreasonable, but a tear dropped from the corner of her eye as if it had been waiting for him to speak. Her heart ached like waves upon the shore in the steady rhythm of the tides. 

They opened at his touch, the feeling of being held so foreign it was barely recognizable. But his arms around her were solid, and his breath in her hair was warm. And maybe something inside her chest healed just a tiny bit with the touch.

“Link. Stay. It’s misery being alone.”

A hand rubbed over her back in soothing circles.

“I know. I’ll stay. I won’t live in the castle, but I’ll always come back to you.”

She nodded, at a loss for words as her throat bubbled with the sobs she contained. It wasn’t sadness; she didn’t feel sad. In fact, there was warmth spreading throughout her entire body such as she hadn’t known since the Calamity had been defeated and she had felt the warmth of the sun touch her skin for the first time in one hundred years. 

No, this was relief, and Zelda pressed into it. 

And it felt like coming home.

**Author's Note:**

> You guys, I don't know why, but I always seem to end up finishing and posting the works I like the least. I'm sorry for the bad quality content. Lol. Honestly, I just need to kick my perfectionism to the curb and finish my good stories. Anyway...
> 
> Thanks for reading, and have a great day!


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